Hot off the presses: We’ve just published our 2014 US and Canadian Bank Digital Sales Benchmark reports, in which we assess the public websites of the five largest retail banks in each country — as well as their mobile sites and downloadable apps for smartphones and tablets. Our benchmark looks at a range of criteria across four categories: discover, explore, buy, and onboard (see image below).

Read the full reports by clicking on the following links:

Here are some of the findings from the research:

Bank of America narrowly edges out the competition to take the top US spot. For the second year in a row, Bank of America earns the highest overall score among the five largest retail banks. The firm excels by simplifying the online application process (it takes just a few minutes and guides the user with clear feedback and progress indicators) while supporting digital shoppers with chat and click-to-call options. At the same time, Bank of America enables easy cross-channel shopping for digital researchers who want to move offline to apply, with branch appointment scheduling available online.

Mobile banking success is a moving target: Customers needs and expectations are changing rapidly, and eBusiness teams at banks are sprinting to get ahead of their customers’ expectations. To achieve this, firms are rolling out new features, optimizing existing services, and enhancing mobile experiences.

To understand which firms are leading in mobile banking — and to better gauge the mobile banking landscape overall — we used our Mobile Banking Functionality Benchmark to evaluate and rank the mobile banking efforts of 15 of the largest banks in North America, Western Europe, and Australia.

Chase takes the top spot overall. Chase received the highest overall score among the banks we evaluated, netting a score of 71 out of 100. The bank offers mobile banking services across a range of touchpoints ranging from smartphone apps, strong mobile websites, and two-way SMS. In addition, Chase also has strong mobile money movement features such as bill pay – including the ability to add a payee – and mobile transfer capabilities.